A Bad Day
by Perkele
Summary: Koizumi Itsuki is having a very bad day. A short one-shot which offers an alternative look behind the young man's mind.


Author's notes: Just something I scribbled together in an hour or something a way back. This isn't really how I imagine Koizumi to spend his days, but I always like doing something different. And I guess it might have been more of me having had a bad day a long time ago than anything else; a way to vent, as it were. But instead of letting this gather byte-sized dust on my hard-drive, I might as well put it out there.

* * *

><p>The hours passed just as slowly, the days just as tediously for Koizumi Itsuki as they did for everyone else in the world.<p>

It was just one of those days. Those days when you just hate everyone and everything around you. A day when you curse the 'gifts' you have been given, when you despise the life you have been given. And most of all, you hate the idiots, freaks, weirdoes and losers you're surrounded by. Not a normal day, but something that still happened far too often, all in all.

He plays the game as he always does, shifting a piece from one spot to another, just as complacently as the smile he keeps in place, never giving the pieces as much thought as he does for the real pawns in the room along with him. He hates it. Hates it all. The dim-witted fool he plays against notices nothing as he stumbles his way about to slow victory, as Koizumi pretends to partake in the game, when he is busy observing and calculating for a game far more challenging than the crude pieces of plastic could ever demand. The simpleton smiles smugly, making a move Koizumi had seen 14 moves away, but had ignored. He had more important things to do than match wits with this idiot.

_Knight to E4_

While his opponent, and he uses that term loosely, heads towards a checkmate that should occur within three moves if he doesn't mess up badly, Koizumi shifts his focus to another subject, another pathetic example of humanity. Of course he has often speculated that some amount of the blathering, bumbling maid is just a façade, but sometimes it is hard to see it, especially when she seems to overflow with immense levels of incompetence. Why anyone would bother to send such an idiot into the past still eludes him, but he is certain that more is going on than the surface reveals for that very reason. There is a depth there, but how deep? Certainly no dark abyss lingers behind her mask as does behind his, but something stirs in the puddle, just beyond superficial examination.

_Rook to D7_

The silent girl sits close to him, reading a novel the others in the room have never even heard of. One they could never even grasp on any level deeper than the literal. He wonders if the seemingly emotionless alien is any better at dealing with concepts presented in literature. Is she merely compiling data? Or does she see further, to the emotional core that literature seeks to impart on its reader?

Highly unlikely. She reads so she can amass more information. Perhaps so she can find scenarios to use in her interactions with the others. She is the only one he can even remotely respect.

_Bishop to B3_

And then there is of course _her_. The adjective 'ambivalent' doesn't even come close to describing how he feels about her. To him, she is a walking paradox in more ways than one. For her, there is also a grudging respect, much like for the alien, but also a deep seething hatred accompanied by a reverence brought by the profound respect. He hates her for what she has done to the world and most of all to him. He loves how she exemplifies and gives direction to the mysteries of life. He has a sort of infatuation for her unrelenting drive to affirm life, instead of denying it or accepting its shortcomings. He is incredibly annoyed and frustrated by her behaviour, just as much as he is enamoured by her eccentricities.

He hates it how she makes him feel.

He feels small next to her, while clearly being her superior at the same time. She is headstrong and wilful, incredibly beautiful, a woman after many a man's heart. She is belligerent and loud, not to mention disrespectful. He doesn't know whether to love or hate such behaviour.

_Queen to check King_

The game is over.

_A bishop eats his queen, and thus moves to checkmate his own king. Just as intended._

The game is over.

"Ah, it appears I've lost yet again," Koizumi says, smiling tepidly as he shrugs with his hands.

His opponent huffs with triumphant arrogance, crossing his arms before he glances around the room at the girls gathered around him. His eyes linger equally on each one of them, free to do so as much as he pleases, free to pursue whatever avenue he wishes with any of them.

Unlike Koizumi… Held back by a duty of vigilance, chained by a purpose beyond his choice, devoid of even the freedom to express himself fully.

He is having a bad day. A _very_ bad day. A day that never ends.

It is always the same, no matter what mental state he is in. How could he ever be fully happy, when freedom has been taken away from him? By the men and women who order him about behind the scenes, being asked empty questions of no real significance by the idiot, but worst of all, is _her_…

The source of it all. The tyrant who placed him in this state in the first place. Who still controls him to such a degree… He feels sick to the stomach. He has been stripped of any sense of choice, and definitely not by choosing to take orders from conspirators. No, that would still leave choice for him. But with _her_, and her mind, there is no freedom whatsoever. You can tell yourself whatever lies you want, but if the world is nothing but her perception of it, then it follows that all he is and does is nothing more than her desires playing themselves out. He is nothing but a dream. His choices are her fantasies. His thoughts…

Nothing but reflections. Like everything in this world.

Koizumi Itsuki is having a bad day. A very bad day. A day that never ends.


End file.
